When
RRC launched quietly a year ago, we adopted as our symbol a stylized
version of “The Horns”:a modification of the classic
Windows “pointing hand”. We felt it represented music
and computers, which is where the Internet lives. It also represented
one of the few times we actually came up with something clever.

However,
during the recent revamp of the site, we began to have doubts about
our trusty sidekick. There were just too many pictures of douchebag
band guys flashing the horns. People were flashing the horns at
MTV Beach Parties and N*Sync concerts. NuMetalers flashed it when
they weren’t giving the finger. The whole thing had become
a huge cliché, and it seemed like a good time to put it to
bed.

Rather
than make the decision on our own, we thought we would give you,
the readers, the opportunity to vote on it. Before we get to the
voting, though, let’s take a look at a brief history of “The
Horns”:

In
the world of band photography, only one totem approaches the ubiquity
of the brick wall: The “Horns”. We’ve all seen
it thousands of times. It’s the hand gesture, index and pinky
fingers outstretched, meant to symbolize rock and roll, world-weary
ennui and sarcasm or simply “partying down”.

According
to metal singer Ronnie James Dio, he didn’t invent the “horns”
hand gesture, he just popularized it.

“I
was in Sabbath at the time. It was a symbol that I thought was reflective
of what that band was supposed to be all about. It's NOT the devil's
sign like we're here with the devil. It's an Italian thing I got
from my Grandmother.” Dio said in a 2001 interview. “It's
to ward off the Evil Eye or to give the Evil Eye, depending on which
way you do it. It's just a symbol but it had magical incantations
and attitudes to it and I felt it worked very well with Sabbath.
So I became very noted for it and then everybody else started to
pick up on it and away it went. But I would never say I take credit
for being the first to do it.”

As
time passed, the “horns” came to symbolize not only
Sabbath but heavy metal music in general and rock fans the world
over adopted it as a sort of not-so-secret handshake.

“The
Age of Irony” dawned in the early to mid-eighties and among
the “progressive” set, flashing the “horns”
became the visual equivalent to yelling “Freebird” at
a concert. Let’s Active fans had found a way to simultaneously
make fun of the heshers that beat them up in high school while appearing
deliciously droll to their bolo-tied brethren.

By
the time a new generation of kids came on the scene, only jaded
slackers would flash the two-fingered salute in an eye-rolling attempt
to elicit knowing snickers from the rest of the coffee house. Then
came NuMetal.

Rap/Rock
Mooks all across America had learned from their cousins, stepdads,
uncles and cellmates that the horns meant something having to do
with Hard Feckin’ Rawk. It was a way for a guy to scream “Woooooooo!”
without uttering a sound. The horns enjoyed a brief renaissance
until the already painfully derivative genre that nurtured the comeback
began to feed on itself and suck even harder.

Today,
the horns are merely another imagined accouterment of the “band
guy” like his eyeliner or backwards baseball cap. In photos,
it is imperative the band guy flash the horns to identify himself
as someone who “rocks”. The irony lies in the fact that
98% of the people who flash the horns to signify that they rock,
in fact, do not.

So,
on one hand, our little logo is a neat way of saying “Hey
look, it’s Rock and Roll on the web…or something.”
On the other hand, thanks to douchebags like the ones that reside
in our Halls of Douchebags, it’s become a played-out joke
like dookie chains and Jackson guitars.